New ranking of Russia’s 100 most influential women released

Senate speaker Valentina Matviyenko tops the list for the second year in a row, followed by deputy PM for social affairs Olga Golodets.

A new ranking of the 100 most influential
women in Russia was released Monday, with senate speaker Valentina Matviyenko
topping the list for the second year in a row.

She is trailed by Deputy Prime Minister for
Social Affairs Olga Golodets – who grabbed headlines this year for her
opposition to the controversial Russian ban on US adoptions – and Prime
Minister Dmitry Medvedev's press secretary, Natalya Timakova. They ranked
second and third, respectively.

The latest list, covering 2012, was the
second annual ranking presented by four Russian media outlets: Ekho Moskvy
radio station, Interfax and RIA Novosti news agencies and weekly magazine
Ogonyok.

The list includes women in leadership
positions who influenced decision-making in politics or business, women who had
an impact on public opinion by virtue of their professional or public
activities, and women who set an example worth following.

The top three spots in this year's rating
went to political figures, whereas in 2011 pop music legend Alla Pugachyova held
second place, behind Matviyenko and ahead of Timakova. For 2012, Pugachyova
fell to fifth place, but remained the most influential female cultural figure.

The list’s top 10 also includes the chief
justice of the Moscow City Court, Olga Yegorova, the prime minister’s wife
Svetlana Medvedeva, actress Chulpan Khamatova and RIA Novosti editor-in-chief
Svetlana Mironyuk.

The list was compiled using a 20-point
rating system by a panel of 43 people, including State Duma Speaker Sergei
Naryshkin, Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich,
Moskovsky Komsomolets editor-in-chief Pavel Gusev, general director of the
Komsomolskaya Pravda publishing house Vladimir Sungorkin and Rossiyskaya Gazeta
editor-in-chief Vladislav Fronin.

The panel also included representatives of
all factions in the State Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament, including
Deputy Speaker Sergei Zheleznyak of the ruling United Russia party, Communist
Party leader Gennady Zyuganov, leader of the Liberal Democratic Party Vladimir
Zhirinovsky and leader of A Just Russia Sergei Mironov.

All the ratings were done anonymously and
tallied by experts from the Higher School of Economics.